It looked like the season was over for the Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday night. With less than a minute to play against the Dallas Stars, the team stood on the brink of playoff elimination.
Then, in the most improbable finish in NHL history, Vancouver stormed back, scored three goals in the final 60 seconds of regulation, and enjoyed a Kiefer Sherwood goal to complete the Canucks' 6-5 overtime win.
The victory kept the Canucks’ faint playoff hopes alive and marked the first time any team has ever overcome a three-goal deficit in the final minute of regulation.
Aatu Raty opened the late surge with a goal at exactly the one-minute-left mark. Pius Suter followed with his first of the game just over 30 seconds later, cutting the deficit to 5–4.
Finally, with 5.2 seconds left, Suter struck again to tie the game and stun the home crowd in Dallas.
“It was not easy, but we stuck with it,” Suter said. “We were just battling and believing until the end.”
Vancouver’s night had already been a climb with the Canucks entering the final period traling the Stars 3–0 in the scoreboard.
Jake DeBrusk and Victor Mancini scored early in the final period to give the Canucks a fighting chance and bring them close to tying the game, 3-2 just 4:39 into the thrid frame.
Dallas, however, answered with two late goals in a span of 34 seconds, including an empty-netter. The game looked out of reach again—until it wasn’t.
Then, in overtime, Sherwood gathered a loose puck off a scramble and buried the winner for the Canucks to keep alive in the postseason race.
“Says a lot about the group,” Sherwood said. “When adversity hits, we just dig in.”
The Canucks, now with 80 points and four games left, still face long odds to clinch the playoffs.
Vancouver's "tragic number" holds at two, and MoneyPuck gives the Canucks a meager 0.2% chances of reaching the playoffs while projecting them to finish the season with 89.7 points.
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